The following journal entry was an assignment from an imagery worksheet our class was working on. On that day, we were focused on tactile imagery. “Close your eyes and touch some familiar objects at your desk. Then open your eyes and describe to a partner how those objects felt.” This is one of my most favorite entries because I described my position at that time with a lot of details and used many metaphors to capture the readers’ attention. I also like my hook because I believe it will keep a reader interested in the piece of writing. In addition, I tried to relate different scenarios that people may have experienced to the way I was feeling at that time.

I close my eyes. I stop what I am doing much like a machine would stop sewing fabric. As a sniper zones in on his target, I become in tune with my senses, for now nothing else clouds my head. Moving my toes, I feel the moist, claustrophobic area within my boots. My legs are smooth, one crossed over the other for support. The left over the right only, avoiding contact with the wound on my left knee: it tingles. Aggravatingly enough, my skirt rides up my stomach when I am seated and rests just below my belly button. I sit, hunched over in my chair and can feel the pressure of my bad posture on my spine. I know one day I’ll regret this but for now that’s how I’ll sit in the hard, plastic chair. My left hand supports my head which appears to weigh 50 pounds mostly caused by my lack of sleep. My eyelids are broken blinds that refuse to remain open no matter how hard I try. I’ll just do my best to wade through another school day.

Paige Williams

Mrs. Robinson

AP English 3

7/27/07 

 Nature vs. Nurture

      American psychologist John Watson demonstrated that the acquisition of a phobia could be explained by classical conditioning. He used an 11 month old child, Albert, to prove that a person could be conditioned to be afraid of something which he was not previously affected. Little Albert was placed into a room isolated from any other human being or other distracters. Watson then placed a white rat into the room. In the beginning, Albert showed affection towards the rat and played with him from time to time. Later, Watson would produce a very loud noise every time Albert would reach out to touch the rat. As a result, the baby became terrified of every white and furry object in which he came into contact with. “Give me a dozen healthy  infants well-formed, and my own specified world to bring them up in,” Watson informed, “and I’ll guarantee to take any one at random and train him or her to become any type of specialist I might select…regardless of his or her talents, penchants, tendencies, abilities, vocations and race of his ancestors.” (About.com, 2007) As you can see, I believe that nurture is the more important factor when determining the outcome of a person’s characteristics when it comes to the debate of nature vs. nurture. In the book, In Cold Blood, Perry Smith was raised under unstable conditions that shaped his characteristics as an adult. “They found him willing to fight for his rights,” Perry’s father wrote in a letter. “That was the way I raised my kids.”(50) Perry defended himself well in school as a result of his upbringing which shows how his environment had an effect on him. Perry had also learned how his mother treated him and because of the environment she caused, didn’t like her. “…Perry had on several occasions run off, set out to find his lost father,” Capote wrote,  “for he had lost his mother as well, learned to ‘despise’ her…”(156) Nurture obviously contributed to Perry’s behaviors as well as character throughout the novel and Capote made this clear.

Mrs. Robinson

AP English 3

7/24/07

Tone        

       Capote wrote the book, In Cold Blood as an objective narrator because he assumed the camera’s eye. An objective narrator only has an external viewpoint and only observes what the characters actually say or do not actually what the characters were thinking or feeling unless they state so. On the other hand a subjective narrator would be a character actually involved in the novel. You can deduce that Capote is an objective narrator when he writes, “Having made the switch, Dick had dropped the Iowa plates in a municipal reservoir. Then he’d stopped at a filling station where a friend worked…” (232) The narrator is only observing what Dick is doing, not what he is thinking or feeling. In another example, Capote writes that Bobby makes a guess as to whether Sue was as welcoming to him as she had been previously. “Bobby went less frequently to sit in the Kidwells’ tiny, cozy parlor,” Capote writes, “and when he did go, Sue seemed not as welcoming.” (242) With In Cold Blood, it was a little challening to depict whether Capote was using objective tactics or subjective because it was a documentary. You must remember though, that when the characters actually were explaing how they felt or what they thought, there were direct quotes from them.

Mrs. Robinson

AP English 3

7/25/07

Secondary Characters

Mrs. Hartman’s personality is depicted within In Cold Blood although she is merely a secondary character. Capote writes about other secondary characters in the novel also; He does this, I believe, so that the readers can get a better understanding of the impact that these murders had, not only on relatives or close friends, but the small town of Holcomb as well. Mrs. Hartman owns Hartman’s Café and she explains the impact of the case on her business. “Since the trouble started,” Mrs. Hartman recalled, “we’ve been doing all the business we can handle.” (133-134) She also explains about the bedlam that the people of the café are causing with different rumors that have been made. “Because that’s a crime, too-,” Mrs. Hartman states, “telling plain-out lies. But what can you expect? Look around you. Rattlesnakes. Varmints. Rumormongers.” (134) By addressing the viewpoints of secondary characters, Capote explores all branches of the investigation. Households of the residents of Holcomb were also affected. I find Al Dewey the most memorable because he was the most involved with the Clutter case and had developed an obsession. Capote explained how Al Dewey had lost ten pounds and that he was non-stop contemplating the investigation. His actions really put a damper on his family and wife because of the time he was devoting to the case.  Capote really capitalized on the significance secondary characters can have on a novel; after all, secondary characters were crucial to the solution of the investigation.

On the other hand, an ACT scan taken in 1996 revealed profound abnormalities. An EEG performed reveals that there is no electrical activity. This information would certainly lead someone to believe that Terri Shiavo was dead. Though, in my opinion, doctors can not explain everything and after witnessing Terri around her parents it was clear to me that she was alive and was trying to communicate to the best of her abilities even without undergoing the therapy, despite the findings. I’d also like to add that Terri is, in fact, so different from other PVS patients because she was an exception. She was alive. Karen Ann Quinlan and Nancy Cruzan were also PVS patients but unlike Terri, they seemed to be unaware of both their environment and themselves.

With this being said, I believe that the definition of life is alertness and self-awareness and I believe Terri fulfilled this definition. She was not dead and the courts, in fact, did allow her to starve to death.

           A student who has tested HIV positive should be permitted to attend public school. First of all, the HIV virus is not easily transmitted. According to The San Francisco Aids Foundation, it is not enough for a student to merely come into contact with the infected fluid. The skin is a great barrier to protect the body against HIV. The virus can only enter the body through an open cut or sore or the mucus in the mouth, eyes or genitals and it has to get into the blood stream. With this information present, how many kids do you know have contact with each other in school that would allow these types of transitions to be present? Furthermore, if students who are HIV positive are eventually permitted to attend public school, there are going to be numerous parents requesting barriers for these students. So even if the children were attending public schools, there would still be restrictions for safety reasons but the child could live a life as normal as possible.

            Finally, I believe that a person should have the right to choose whether they’ll attend school or whether they should stay home, or at least with parent consent. Unless there is direct danger involved in the situation with the child going to public school, they should be allowed the educational opportunity.  

     If it were possible for me to travel back in time, I would pay a visit to Rosalind Franklin. She deserves much more credit than she received and is due much respect for her accomplishment.

     Rosalind Franklin studied DNA and contributed significantly to the structure of DNA. She recognized that two states of the DNA molecule existed and also defined conditions for the transition. She gained part of this knowledge through the pictures produced from the x-ray differaction images of DNA. Around the same time, James Watson and Francis Crick were also working on the double helix structure and trying to construct accurate models of the DNA strand. Unfortunately, Rosalind’s colleague, Maurice Wilkins, obtained the unpublished image Rosalind developed and gave it to Watson and Crick without her knowledge. This image was crucial evidence for the helical structure and helped define these two men as the founders of the double helix structure.     

     Thus being said, upon my visit, I would inform Rosalind Franklin that her work was very significant and that she should publish her x-ray as soon as possible. I would hope that when Rosalind was able to publish her findings she would obtain the Nobel prize she deserved.